


rock bottom is the landing

by thisismyastralprojection



Series: how far can i fall? [2]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Azula (Avatar) Redemption, Child Azula (Avatar), Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Ozai (Avatar) Being a Terrible Parent, Ozai (Avatar) is an Asshole, POV Azula (Avatar)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-16
Updated: 2021-03-16
Packaged: 2021-03-25 00:35:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,611
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30080760
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thisismyastralprojection/pseuds/thisismyastralprojection
Summary: Azula and her bestie, Trauma.orAzula thinks she's gotten better. Has she really?
Relationships: Azula & Iroh (Avatar), Azula & Zuko (Avatar)
Series: how far can i fall? [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2213172
Comments: 6
Kudos: 32





	rock bottom is the landing

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! this is part two of this series. I think I'm really proud of this one! Before I begin:
> 
> This work was *heavily* inspired (and references slightly) by [this piece of art/comic ](https://www.instagram.com/p/CIgH0QcFNvO/) by cardboardghost on instagram, and the (sort of?) lyrics used in this are from [this video specifically ](https://vm.tiktok.com/ZMeBC84Ym/), although the lyrics and the original is from [this sound ](https://vm.tiktok.com/ZMekAEH1W/) (original credit is specified under the sound, i can't find the original video. let me know if you did.)
> 
> One more thing: I do villainize Jet in this (which I am very sorry for, although it did fit the storyline. :(
> 
> thanks!!

_[I’m gonna be just like you]_

“What do you want to be like when you grow up, Azula?”

What kind of question was that? Azula holds back a scoff, and answers, “I want to be like my dad. I’m going to own a big company and he’s going to be so proud of me. Obviously.”

“That's wonderful Azula. Next!”

As the teacher drones on, Azula looks around the room, stopping on Ty Lee. She notices, and smiles at her from across the circle. Azula looks back at her, blushing slightly. 

Her brain circles back to the question. What do you want to be like in the future? Of course she was going to be like her dad, what kind of question was that? He was the best dad in the world. Turning back to her workbook, she noticies question three is incorrect. She frowns, erasing her answer and correcting it. Perfection is demanded and expected, after all.

///

Azula stands on her mother’s grave, reading the words on the tombstone silently. Ursa Fire. She turns at the sound of footsteps, her father getting out of the car.

“Who do you love most, Azula?” Ozai smiles down and rests a hand on her shoulder, but all Azula can see is a silhouette of her father. The sun shines too brightly in her eyes, so she moves to the side.

“You, father. Of course.”

///

_[No matter what you say I can do]_

Zuko’s screaming. The house smells like smoke, and Azula’s standing in the kitchen next to her sobbing mess of a brother on the floor. She stares forward and exhales, the corners of her lips raising slightly.

Ozai sighs heavily and shuts the stove off. “ . . . And that’s what happens. Now get out.”

“Wh-what?” he looks up, tears streaming down his face.

“GET. OUT.” Her father grits his teeth, a dangerous edge to his voice. “Get the _fuck_ out of my house before I do anything worse to you.” He pulls Zuko up by his collar, shoving the boy towards the door.

Azula shuts her eyes as the door slams, and as she opens her eyes, she catches a glimpse of a shadow sprinting away. She turns to go back to her room, trying not to think about where her brother would go next.

The moment her hand touches the banister, however, Azula is stopped by Ozai’s voice.

“Who do you love most, Azula?”

She closes her eyes, pressing her lips tightly together to prevent anyhing stupid from leaving her mouth.

“I . . . “ she lets out a breath. “You . . . Father.”

“Damn right.”

///

_[I’ll follow you until the day]_

It's almost midnight.

_Fuck._

Azula sits on her bed, shaking. She slowly rolls off, and grabs her favourite hoodie. Its red, sharpied stars scribbled along the sleeve. She exhales shakily, putting it on before grabbing a pair of socks.

Time to go.

Midnight.

///

_[I can smile at you and say]_

If Azula thought her father, no, _sperm donor_ was scary when she lived with him, she was definitely wrong. She sits silently in court, watching Ozai scream about why he deserves to raise Azula and have custody over her. And although she won’t admit it, she’s terrified. She tucks her fingers under her thighs, hiding the fact that her hands are shaking. She can’t go back to her father, she _can’t_. Throughout the entire day, she’s praying silently under her breath, muttering praises to gods she doesn’t believe in, begging to any deity that would listen. The thought of even stepping foot inside Ozai’s house takes away all the air in her lungs. Her heart twists frantically and her brain feels like it's being crushed. 

She spares a glance next to her a couple hours in. Zuko sits silently, face just as pale. She knows he wouldn’t tell _her_ , but she can tell Zuko’s fear easily, it comes almost naturally to her when that was the face she’d seen each day when they used to live with Ozai.

However much Azula doesn’t want to go back and live with Ozai, she knew it had to be ten times worse for her brother a few months ago. If she closes her eyes, she can still hear the screams and sobbing of that night, the thuds and shouts of her father as he stormed around the kitchen, furious. She opens her eyes again. There isn’t much of a difference, but Azula would rather see the nightmare in front of her than rewatch the horrors of the nightmares before.

When Ozai finally stops shouting, the room feels a little lighter, but Azula knows better. The moments after the yelling are the worst, and as she looks at the terror on the jury’s faces, she can tell they understand too. It's a sort of stifling silence, the kind that fills your ears and shreds your brain into pieces. Azula looks at the man who raised her once more, and she can tell he knows it too. His face is smug, so, so, _so,_ certain he’s proved his point, until Iroh’s representative starts talking and Azula has to look away.

Her fingers are itching to do something, to do _anything_ that would get her away from this place. She massages her temples, trying to keep back a headache that's starting to resurface. The only thoughts going through her head at this point are the ones that involve cursing out Ozai and the ones that are still desperately hoping that she won’t end up with Ozai.

When Azula is able to escape to a bathroom during a break, she shuts herself into the first stall and locks the door. After making sure the door is locked, she sinks into a crouch and buries her head in her arms. “Agni, please. Please, please, please, I’m begging you, keep him away from me. I don’t know what I’d do if I went back, I can’t, I _won’t_ go back.” she whispers, choking back sobs.

After a few minutes of crying in a bathroom stall and drying her tears with the crappy paper towel from the dispenser, Azula heads back to the courtroom. She’s careful, once again, to avoid emotion, despite the need to leave and cry _again_ storming inside her. Again, she drapes a mask devoid of expressions over her face and exhales. They were almost there, if it all went right today, Iroh told her earlier, she’d get to stay with her uncle and brother permanently.

_Do you really deserve it though?_

Azula closes her eyes, trying to hold back that thought, but she fails and her mind crashes back into a whirl of memories.

 _“Why do you deserve this?”_

Azula still remembers a week ago, when she showed up at Iroh’s doorstep at one in the morning, crying. She remembers how utterly _cold_ she was, and how much of a contrast her bed back at home Ozai’s house was compared to the one in her new room. There was something different about being at Iroh’s house compared to Ozai’s house, and she knew while it made no sense physically, Iroh’s home was just . . . warmer.

And still, while she knows she deserved absolutely nothing from Zuko, she’s still hurt by the way he treated her. Any rational person would. Sure, they had both been through a lot, but didn’t Azula deserve kindness too?

_“You can’t just come into my home, the only place I’ve felt safe for years, and claim you were running from Dad too. You can’t show up here after everything I’ve worked for, after I’ve tried so hard to distance myself from everything you and Dad were. I don’t want you here. I don’t want another copy of Dad here.”_

Azula can still remember how she didn’t respond and just stood there, tears filling her eyes. She had almost lashed out, before holding herself back. She wouldn’t bring herself to Zuko’s level, no matter how badly she wanted to, so she turned around, and cried alone in her bed that night. Her only condolence was that at least she was away from Ozai, but had she really traded one source of pain for another? Azula couldn’t even look at her brother without thinking about that day with Mai and . . . Ty Lee.

She sighs, opening her eyes once more. Again, she tries to bring her focus back to the trial, and as sound slowly comes back to her, she’s dimly aware of Zuko shaking her shoulder and Iroh speaking softly to her. Something big must have happened, Azula knows that, because if _Zuko’s_ touching her then it's either very good or very bad.

He looks terrified, and everything comes to a stop the moment she sees her brother’s face.

“No, I can’t go back, I can’t-” Azula starts trying to get out of her seat, but is held back by Iroh.

“Azula, no, no, you’re staying with us. We won.”

“Wh-what?” She can’t believe it, there’s no way Ozai could have lost this court battle. Even if he did, why would she have been blessed like this? Didn’t the universe want to punish her, just like it always did?

“Azula,” Zuko speaks to her for the first time that day, and his voice is softer, and perhaps there’s a bit of fear in his eyes when he looks at her, but he remains calm. “You don’t have to go back to dad-- Ozai anymore. You live with Iroh now.” 

It finally sinks in for Azula, and holy _shit_ , she feels like she could run for miles. A smile starts making its way onto her face, and before she knows it, she’s grinning, elated. It’s almost too good to be true, but for once, she’ll let herself believe she’s good, that she’s safe, that she’ll never have to think about Ozai ever again.

When they leave the courthouse, she’s laughing again.

///

_[Big brother, I’m just like you]_

If there was one thing Azula had to say about her friends before everything happened that day, she’d say how much they meant to her and how they’d never hurt her.

Now, however, the second half of that was broken.

She was having a good day before that afternoon. Her homework was finished, her favourite playlist blasting on her speaker, and she didn’t have a Jasmine Dragon shift until next week. 

She leans back in her chair, slowly spinning the seat. _Ping!_ A message from OmashuText pops up at the top of her screen, so Azula taps the notification, not bothering to read the content of the message before opening the app.

 **_Jet_ ** **has left Groupchat "** **_daddy issues"_ **

What? That didn’t even make any sense, why would he leave? She knows Jet isn't the type to leave a chat as a joke, and if that happened, Sokka or whoever else had been bothering him at the time would add him back.

Scrolling up in the chat, there didn’t seem to be any sort of conflict or problems that had happened recently either. So according to Azula, there was probably only one option that made sense. Something bad did happen, and it was probably with Zuko or Sokka. 

Her first instinct would usually be to ignore the situation and move on like it doesn’t bother her, but the feeling that something was wrong keeps nagging at her, and now, her mind won’t stray from the thought that there’s a problem. Sighing, she clicks into her private dms, and messages Jet.

<azula 4:10 pm>

**if this is ab zuko or sm like that I’m gonna bonk you in the head /lh /s**

<jet 4:14 pm>

**leave me alone**

Azula pauses, staring at the blinking cursor. That was a little harsher than she had expected, but since Jet _technically_ hasn’t told her to fuck off and go away yet, she keeps persisting.

<azula 4:15 pm>

**well ofc but zuko doesn’t hate you**

**no one does**

She watches Jet’s little icon type for a few minutes, stopping and then retyping again and again. What had happened?

<jet 4:18 pm>

**eat shit azula. Why don’t you go back to torturing your brother, huh?**

Her blood runs cold. “What the fuck?” Azula whispers, stopping the seat from turning more. How could Jet say that? He knows how sensitive she is to comments like that, and for it to come so unprovoked lights another fire within her.

<jet 4:18 pm>

**fuckin ozai jr.**

She’s speechless, stunned and shocked. Her fingers hover over the keyboard, fingers itching to type out an equally biting response. _Why can’t I think of anything to say? I used to be good at this, why does this hurt so much-_

She leaves the message on _read_ , and just in time anyways, because when she goes back to think of something to say, a popup stops her from typing, stating that she’s been blocked. Good riddance. Azula drops her phone on her bed, her mind continuously circling back to Jet’s words.

 _Ozai jr_.

Did he really think she was her father? Her first instinct would be to reject that, she had worked too hard in therapy to let this get to her but-

_Why don’t you just go back to torturing your brother?_

No, no, Azula doesn’t do that anymore. Both Zuko and her were victims, she remembers apologizing over and over again to her brother until it had become almost a mantra.

So why did he say that then? Jet rarely lied about small things, much less something as big as this. If Jet thought that, (and she once did consider Jet as the group’s moral point, which Azula now realizes was fucked up, considering what he had just said.) then everyone must have, right? 

She shuts her eyes, a few tears slipping out. So did _everyone_ think Azula was still a copy of her father? _I’m not a bad person, am I?_

Jet doesn’t seem to think so. 

Azula doesn’t even know why she’s believing Jet at this point. She won’t let herself think it, but she knows that while Jet is always a go-to standard, everything he’s done, everything he’s said now, messes that up.

She sighs, wiping away her tears. When she opens the groupchat to respond to whatever mundane meme Sokka has sent for the day, she can’t even bring herself to type out something, anything. Her breath is shaky as her view of the screen starts to blur, tears coming back. 

**Leave Groupchat " _daddy issues_ "** **?**

 **[yes]** **no**

Azula knows that if she stays, something else will happen and right now, her brain can’t bring herself to deal with any more pain. She presses **[yes]** and puts down her phone again. Her fingers itch for something to do, something to create or destroy. Letting out a breath, her eyes slide over to the bottom drawer of her desk, and she opens it, reaching for the box at the back.

Her matches.

She opens the tiny cardboard box, pulling out one match. Striking the match on the red panel on the side, the tip becomes alight with a flame. Azula stares at the fire for a moment, watching it flicker and burn, before she pulls over the can of papers on the corner of her desk. After, she drops the match into the can, letting the fire devour the scraps of papers, the room filling with the smell of smoke.

Within seconds the papers are destroyed and the flame goes out. Azula looks into the can, only seeing ashes where there were once paper scraps. The papers are gone now, all destroyed.

_They’re gone like everything worth anything now. I guess I really am like Dad. All I do is destroy._

**Author's Note:**

> azula using tone indicators? i agree. (/lh is light hearted, /s is sarcastic)
> 
> I also now realized I forgot to clarify how old Azula is (thank you to the commenter who asked this, I'm sorry for the misunderstanding), so she's around 7-9 in the first part, around 9 in the second part, 12 in the third part, 14-15 in the fourth, 14-15 in the fifth, and 16-17 in the last one.
> 
> how are we feeling?
> 
> as always, kudos and comments are appreciated!


End file.
